Sacramento daily record-union. [volume] (Sacramento [Calif.]) 1875-1891, 1887-07-16
LAND OF TIE MONTEzUMAS.
ROMANCE FAST DISAPPEARING
BEFORE MODERN PROGRESS.
A Section so Rich that the IndiaAs
Load Their Guns with Balls
of Pure Silver.
IRFcoRD-UN1oS Special Correspondence. !
xf. T., ~ ,oy-

RECoRD-USIOS Special CorresV onGe1ce.
CRY OF MEXICO, June %, 1887.
If you are contemplating trip to Mex
lco-as most good Americans are in these
days. wish to impress upon your mind
that the sooner you make it the better.
Were you going to Europe, to China,
Jerusalem, or to any other country where
make little difference whether you went
now or a number of years later. But not
SO in Mexico. Here everything is in
transition state, old things are fast passing
away, and not only the ancient landmarks,
bat customs and traditions which gave the
country its greatest charm, are disappear
ing like dew before the morning sun.
Commercially and educationally the
march of progress may be an improve
ment, but 1t is certainly death TO romance
and picturesqueness.
The old-time cdSas of Moorish architect
ure, which in other days were forts as well
as castles, are being tricked out with mod
ern ginger bread work" in base imita-
ton of the pasteboard houses of the United
States, with much the same effect that the
ribbons and gew-gaws of sweet sixteen y
would produce upon the wrinkled brow of
an octogenarian. In
THE DRESS OF TIRE PEOPLE
The change is even more decidedly for
the worse. Nothing could possibly be
more appropriate and becoming TO these
dark-eyed JericatoS than their wide SOM
breos, short jackets, silver bedecked
brooches and gorgeous silken sashes and
for beautiful women of the Spanish and
Indian type, the graceful lace mantilla,
draped about the head and shoulders. But
now every woman of fashion must have a
hideons hat or bonnet Ia americana ;
and the men of wealth no longer prom
enade the plazas in those distracting Span
ish cloaks, with one satin-lined corner
tossed over the shoulder, which are war
ranted to make the plainest and most I'M
romantic of men look like veritable
Romeo. Now they insist upon London
made garments, as nearly like those of
Northeners as possible, regardless of the
vast difference in the makeup of the
Anglo Saxon and Latin races
The broad brimmed, silver-laden SOM
brero, too-so perfectly adapted to the
eternal sunshine, aud SO becoming to
swarlhy skins and midnight eyes-must
give place to the stiff little hats in vogue
among Americans-in many instances, |
grieve to add, to those incomparably ugly
silken tiles, which make the handsomest
Mexican look like fool of the first water.
Even the lower classes are fast discarding
the serape-that most picturesque and con-
venient of wrappings-and adopting in
their stead any kind of shoddy overcoat
for evening wear. Formerly, one of the
charms of every rural gathering was the
vivid coloring produced by the multitude
of bright-hued serapes, each ranchero and
half wearing one slung over his
shoulders, and regarding it-next to the
sombrero-as his most precious earthly
possession.
The names of the streets are rapidly
changing, from the poetical and intensely
religious to nomenclature the most prosaic :;
as, for example, =" the street of the Sad In
dian, and Crown of Thorns street" are
now called respectively Fourth avenue and
Diaz street. With characteristic poor taste.
the Government is doing all in its power to
aid and abet these sad innovations. First
is silenced the Cathedral bells, which in
the good old days were constantly calling
the faithful to prayers; then it abolished
all conyentual and monastic orders, and
forbade the wearing of priestly habits upon
the streets, SO that now the cowl and hemp
in girdle, the dear old shovel-hats, and
the black or gray robes of hooded nuns no
more lend picturesqueness to every scene.
1t is, however,
A SINGULAR CIRCUMSTANCE
That about the same time the edict went
forth which rendered homeless thousands
of the gentle sisterhood whose lives had
been consecrated to charity and holiness.
a law was passed licensing the occupation
of another class of females upon the simple
condition that each should carry q book
containing her number and wear certain
style of habit,
Most of the old time religious process
sions and pageants of superstition were
prohibited BY law, some years ago and
since DiaZ'S last administration even the
Passion Play formerly the great event of
the year in the rural districts, occupying at
least seven days. has been strictly forbid
den, to the great grief of the Indians and
the disappointment of tourists.
The same high authority is compelling
the owners of buildings to paint out the
political or high flown names under which
they once reioiced, and to substitute some
thing common place, more i'll accordance
with the spirit of the age. Who would not
rather see putqueria-with its rose
wreathed barrels, poppy decked tankards,
curtain of woven rushes intertwined with
marigolds before the door, and picture of
the owners patron saint set up among the
bottles-dedicated ITO the Loves of
Venus" to La Santissima Virgin de
or even to La Madre de
Dios," than called John Smiths place.
or in plain terms, Hans Pretzef's sa-
loon 2"
Though in the Mexican capital the trans
formation is almost complete, in the rural
districts one still finds plenty of pulquerias
whose names are the incarnation of quaint
ness. l saw one the other day whose am
biguous title, painted in big letters across
the front, is: "Vamanos al Colo de Mex
ice" (" Let us 60 to the Gulf of Mexico ~:
another is called Seven Little Loves - an
other, The Angel of the Annunciation ~
another, The Holy Spirit of Hope; y Ghile
hundreds are Dedicated to the Mother of
Christ" or to Jesus himself, and so on
through all the saints in the calendar and
all the suggestions and poetical notions
that have taken hold of these people.
Visit this country, / repeat, before all
that is antique and beautiful in architect
ure shall have been ruthlessly DESTROYED by
vAND6L PROPERTY OWNERS;
Before all the blue-haired and pink-eved
saints shall have been knocked down from
their inches in the house-walis and bridges;
before the ways:de shrines, where every
passer used to kneel and cress himself, are
all removed; before the stone floors of the
ancient sanctuaries, worn into hoIlows by
the knees of worshipers long gone to dust,
shall have been replaced by pine boards.
and the fat-legged angels and no-legged
cherubim, carved upon the massive doors
and outer walls, shall have been daubed
with sacrilegious paint and whitewash;
come before the sandalled rurales and the
handsome haciendadoes shall have changed
their graceful equestrian costumes for
stove-pipe hats and other northern abom-
nations.
The utilitarians, with their alleged i'm
are especially hard upon an
Iique buildings erected during the Spanish
domination. Within the last ten wears
fully nine-tenths of the old converts and
monasteries (once the finest structures in
Mexico next to the cathedrals) have been
utterly ruined as TO beauty of outline and
harmony of proportion, because the sordid
purchasers, in order to obtain large rentals,
have turned them into tenement houses.
bowling. alleys, gambling rooms and dane
ing halls. Thousands OF the churches
have been similarly desecrated All over
MpSiPo from Ialana on fl,a rr,If ,o-=t -